A new family of microcontrollers have been added to Infineon Technologies’ PSoC portfolio of Arm Cortex-based, high performance, low power, secured devices.
PSoC Edge is designed for next generation, responsive compute and control applications, featuring hardware-assisted machine learning (ML) acceleration. The microcontrollers enable end products to be more intelligent and intuitively usable, by lowering the barrier in human-machine interaction and adding contextual awareness to end applications, explained Infineon. At the same time, they provide robust privacy and safety protection through embedded Infineon Edge Protect technologies.
Microcontrollers in the new PSoC Edge portfolio offer a mix of scalable power and performance to support emerging AI/ML requirements, extensive HMI capabilities and security features required for next-generation applications. All supported with a deep ecosystem of software and tools, fit for task, said Steve Tateosian, senior vice president of microcontrollers for Infineon.
The PSoC Edge devices are based on Arm Cortex-M55, including Helium DSP support paired with Arm Ethos-U55 and Cortex-M33 paired with Infineon’s low power NNLite which is a proprietary hardware accelerator intended to accelerate the neural networks used in ML and AI applications. There is also support for always-on sensing and response which makes them suitable for advanced IoT and industrial segments such as smart home, security, wearables and robotics, said the company. The family of devices comes with non-volatile, on-chip RRAM as well as high speed, secured external memory support. The PSoC Edge family provides scalability for next-generation intelligent systems while enabling software reuse and portability, Infineon added.
The enhanced intelligence of the PSoC Edge family extends support for advanced graphics, voice, audio and vision-based applications to the existing PSoC portfolio. The new family enables easy migration of applications within the family, as well as an upgrade path from existing designs.
Developers can leverage the power of PSoC Edge for current and future design needs. There is also a strong ecosystem partners, comprehensive documentation and the ModusToolbox software, including integration with Imagimob Studio AI to accelerate time to market.
Infineon’s ModusToolbox software platform provides a collection of development tools, libraries, and embedded runtime assets for a flexible and comprehensive development experience for consumer IoT, industrial, smart home and wearable applications.
Imagimob Studio is an Edge AI development platform, integrated into ModusToolbox, and delivers end to end ML development, from data in to model deployed. There are starter projects and Imagimob’s Ready Models available all designed to support developer deploying ML models for the edge.
The PSoC Edge family is available for early access customers now.
Wearable
Silicon capacitors are smallest in the industry, says Rohm
Claimed to achieve the industry’s smallest size in a mass-produced surface mount package, the BTD1RVFL are silicon capacitors from Rohm for use in smartphones and wearable devices.
Smartphones and other devices with growing functionality require smaller components that support high-density mounting, explained the compay. Silicon capacitors using thin film semiconductor technology can provide higher capacitance in a thinner form factor than existing multilayer ceramic capacitors (MLCCs). They also have stable temperature characteristics and high levels of reliability.
These latest silicon capacitors are manufactured using proprietary RASMID miniaturisation technology which allows processing in one micron increments that eliminates chipping during external formation and improves dimensional tolerances within ±10 micron. This small variation in product size enables mounting with a narrower distance between adjacent components. At the same time, the rear electrode used for bonding to the substrate has been expanded to the periphery of the package to improve mounting strength.
The first products in the series to be released are the BTD1RVFL102 (1000pF) and BTD1RVFL471 (470pF). They are in 01005-size (0.1 x 0.05inch) and 0402-size (0.4mm x 0.2mm) packages. The surface mount silicon capacitors’ mounting area is reduced by approximately 55 per cent cent over general 0201-size (0.2 x 0.1inch) / 0603-size (0.6 x 0.3mm) products to just 0.08mm2.
A built-in TVS protection element ensures high ESD resistance that minimises the number of person-hours required for surge countermeasures and other circuit design elements, added Rohm.
A second series is planned for release in 2024 featuring superior high frequency characteristics and targeting high speed, large capacity communications equipment.
The capacitors are available from online distributors DigiKey and Mouser.
Rohm Semiconductor develops and manufactures a very large product range from SiC adiodes and MOSFETs, analogue ICs such as gate drivers and power management ICs to power transistors and diodes to passive components.
Production takes place in Rohm’s manufacturing plants in Japan, Germany, Korea, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, and China.
Rohm Semiconductor Europe has its head office near Dusseldorf in Germany, serving the Europe, Middle East, and Africa.
Wearable tracker uses key biomarkers
The Nnoxx One wearable device that tracks biomarkers in the body can be worn by professional athletes and casual gym-goers, said Nnoxx. It uses a range of sensors to measure nitric oxide (NO) and muscle oxygenation (SmO2) levels during exercise. (Nitric oxide increases blood flow oxygen delivery to the heart, brain and muscles.)
3D-circuits technology shrinks medical wearable devices
3D-MID (mechatronic integrated devices, also known as 3D-circuits) technology integrates circuits directly into three-dimensional thermoplastic substrates, said Harting. This can shrink the circuitry and end product, for example, the housing of a hearing aid can be used to support the circuitry, replacing a separate circuit board.
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